New Orleans Pelicans: 5 overreactions to 114-92 win over Miami Heat

The New Orleans Pelicans were impressive in their 114-92 win over the Miami Heat.

After winning their first preseason game against the Miami Heat, the New Orleans Pelicans are clearly on their way to an NBA championship!

Ok, not really, but the preseason is the time for wild overreactions, from swinging from “this guy is the worst player ever,” to “He’s the next MVP!” in the span of a few minutes.

So take all of these reactions for what they are, overreactions. We can’t learn too much from preseason, nor from a win over a Miami team that didn’t feature two of its best players.

But it was nice to see the New Orleans Pelicans get a win and there were some early signs that some of the problems have been addressed.

Here are five overreactions after the first game, two about the team play and three about individual players.

New Orleans Pelicans: The defense has improved under Stan Van Gundy

Overreaction #1: Stan Van Gundy has fixed the defense!

Ok, so it’s too early to tell if this is true but there were promising signs that Stan Van Gundy has started to do what he was brought to New Orleans to do, which is teach this team how to defend.

The Pelicans passed the eye test last night, getting after loose balls, closing out on 3-point shooters, closing out possessions with defensive rebounds and not giving up easy points.

The numbers support it, as the Pelicans allowed only 38 points in the paint to the Heat after averaging 52 a game last season. They only let up seven fast break points, another area of emphasis.

This is because they only turned the ball over 11 times and this is after coughing it up six times in the first quarter. Few turnovers equal few fastbreak points.

The Pelicans out-defended, out-rebounded and out-hustled the Heat, which is something we rarely got to say last season.

Stan Van Gundy’s teaching is already having an effect and the Pelicans looked like a different team on the defensive end.